With the video game industry’s annual trade show officially kicking off on Wednesday, Reuters sat down with Mike Gallagher, the new head of the Entertainment Software Association. As the chief lobbyist for an industry blamed for making the world’s youth slothful and even murderous, Gallagher will need to call on every bit of the diplomatic and negotiating skills he developed as an assistant secretary of commerce and as a telecommunications lawyer.

Read on to hear why Gallagher thinks games are a vital piece of America’s entertainment scene, how misunderstanding of games spans the political spectrum, and why gamers should learn from ham radio operators.

Q. What drew you to this job? Why video games?

Gallagher: What attracts me to this industry, first of all, is that I use the products. I have a fascination and curiosity and enjoyment with the titles that goes back a long way. I have two kids, 13 and 11, so it’s second nature for me to have excitement for what this industry is about and that’s great games.

When I worked on the 1996 telecoms act, there were a number of dream scenarios and of course it turned out to be different than what they predicted. That term “convergence” is happening right now in video games. Now you have movies and music and video coming together in one place and the one place where it is richest is video games.

Q. What are your biggest challenges, the one or two biggest problems you want to tackle?

Gallagher: I’m being real careful because the first thing I need to do is listen, and I need to listen a lot and listen carefully to industry members and stakeholders. I have been in a 6-week cram session since I came aboard to learn all about the industry, whether it’s the business side, the member companies which all approach the market very differently.

They all have different histories, different expectations, different theories about what’s going to drive growth in the market. For example, you look at the Nintendo Wii, they are all about expanding the market, bringing in new video-game players. Whereas Microsoft, they’re for that too, a bigger market, but they are about driving the richness of the experience. You look at the investment in the technology and platforms and it’s reflected there. One’s a very hi-def, surround-sound experience … and the other one is definitely targeted to price, ease of use, right out of the box it’s intuitive what to do.

One thing, and it’s an asset for this industry, is what a tremendously passionate consumer base there is. Video game players love video games and they love to blog about them and write about them and talk about them. They are tough critics but they are very active and one of my goals will be to rely upon and turn that energy into the policy environment so that members of Congress and other leaders in government positions know the true metrics of the industry. And that is that the average video game player is 33 years old, that they’ve played for an average of 12 years, that the average video game purchaser is 40. So we’re not talking about 13-year-olds in dark rooms. It’s much broader than that and it is a rich part of our country’s entertainment experience. I want to do everything I can to create an environment for growth for this industry, where policymakers embrace video games, and what they bring instead of the more recent pattern, which has been to pick on them for false stereotypes.

Q. You mentioned this passionate fan base. One thing that separates the ESA from other lobbying organizations is that video gamers really see you as their champion, not just for the companies but for gamers. Whereas, say for movies, movie-goers don’t necessarily view the MPAA as their advocate.

Gallagher: When I was on the Hill, in the administration, in the spectrum space, the radio frequency spectrum, there’s a group of users called the ham radio operators, or the amateurs. There are 800,000 of them in the United States, that’s all. And it’s a technology that is very much rooted in pre-World War II. They are passionate, they are heard and they are accommodated. If there is one group to look at and say it can be done, simply look at the amateur radio community. They are very, very effective in Washington D.C. at making sure that their use of the radio frequency spectrum is protected. Every member of Congress has them in their district, all of them vote, all of them write letters and they are a very loud group.

Well, two-thirds of American homes have video-game players in them. Two-thirds of American families are playing video games, and a fair number of those are very energized about it. That’s a much greater number than what other groups have, and we look forward to activating that and informing that group about what is happening so they can in turn focus that energy where it needs to be applied, which is back at their elected representatives and appointed representatives.

Q. How do you face the political challenge? Games, fairly or unfairly, come under fire from both sides of the political spectrum. Republicans are seen as more socially conservative, yet some of the harshest critics of games are Democrats. How do you tailor the message for both political parties?

Gallagher: By being ruthlessly bipartisan. Our industry has succeeded when we’ve been bi-partisan in the past. My background is completely bi-partisan. I’m an identified Republican, proud to be a Republican, I’ve worked in a Republican administration. But the member of Congress I worked for came from a toss-up district, and that tempered my view of politics and how to approach it.

It’s by being ruthlessly bi-partisan, by appealing to both, making sure I’m informing both parties about the merits and strengths of video games, and also it’s really telling them, capturing the imagination of the policymakers about where we’re going, because it’s so different than the stereotypes that they are operating off of with some of these bad ideas. Those ideas appeal to both the right and the left and we’re going to make the case to both sides.

It’s not necessarily the EAS doing it, it’s the magic of the products of this industry, the titles that are produced, the storytelling capabilities, the technology. There’s no one putting more technology, higher technology, in the American home than this industry. There’s no one doing more to drive broadband growth than video games. PriceWaterhouseCoopers says 25 percent of broadband users at the end of the decade will be using video games. We’re a driver for that. Broadband is a national policy goal, it’s a competitiveness issue and video games are squarely in the mix of driving that. Also, for California and other places that welcome video games, it’s a job engine.

Q. In terms of policy then, where are your efforts going to focus? Is it more in trying to thwart bad law that would ban or restrict games, or how do you create this environment of growth? We don’t have a video game czar or Ministry of Entertainment.

Gallagher: Thank God we don’t! We really don’t need that as a country. I’ve done scores of international meetings with other countries that have these ministers of culture. Boy, what a mistake that is. But that’s the way they’re designed and we have to work with them. Here are two things we have to focus on policy-wise, I’ll give you three things.

One is, we are making huge investments in intellectual property and the government should make sure we have laws and enforcement capabilities that respect that. When it costs an average of $20 million to make a rich video-game experience, we need to see that investment protected.

Two is, we need to make sure we’re opening up new markets for our products, and that the U.S. government is doing everything it can to enable creation of those opportunities. We’re moving towards, according to PriceWaterhouseCoopers, three out of four sales dollars coming abroad, as a macro-issue for the industry. We need to make sure those markets are open and available and profitable for our companies here.

The third one is we need to make sure that the content of video games is on an even footing with books, magazines, movies and other types of media and not singled out unfairly based on false stereotypes for criticism or legislative abuse. It’s about creating that environment for rich growth for the industry, that’s the macro goal.

This industry is relatively unique. It’s much more high-tech in the sense that high technology does not often go to Washington D.C. with its hand out asking for something from government. Really, we’re asking for the freedom to create, the freedom to write great software and then the freedom to sell those products and that game experience and tell those stories to multiple markets. That’s what this industry is about.